Haitians Barricades Streets Continued In Protest Of UN Source Of Cholera Outbreak

Protests are continuing in Haiti over the cholera outbreak that has now killed more than 1,100 people and infected some 17,000.

Haiti’s “cash-for-work” Seen As A Double-edged Sword

All across Haiti, United Nations, bilateral and non-governmental agencies are running scores of “cash-for-work” programmes. But are they “working”?

Dominican Republic To Host International Conference Of Haiti Donors

Dominican Republic will host the international conference of high level technical donors who’ll evaluate the economic consequences of the quake Haiti.

Israeli Navy Abducts 14 Palestinian Fishermen

Fourteen Palestinian fishermen and 3 international Human Rights Observers (HRO’s) were surrounded by the Israeli Navy and taken from their boats 7 miles off the coast of Deir al Balah, Gaza Strip.

The fishermen and the HRO’s were transferred from 3 separate boats to the Israeli warships. Other Palestinian fishermen reported that the 3 boats were seen being taken north by the Israeli Navy.

The Human Rights Observers are Andrew Muncie, a Scottish British citizen, Vittorio Arrigoni, an Italian citizen, and Darlene Wallach, an American citizen. They have been volunteering with the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) since they entered Gaza on ships with the first Free Gaza Movement voyage on the 23rd August 2008. All internationals have previous experience working with the ISM in the West Bank.

Fellow activists have been unable to establish contact with the HRO’s or with the fishermen since they were abducted.

Since their arrival, the ISM volunteers have been regularly accompanying Palestinian fishermen who are regularly attacked by Israeli navy vessels from as little as 3km from shore. They have regularly filmed Israeli forces using live ammunition, shells and water cannons against unarmed fishermen.

Source: International News Reports

• UN Human Rights Chief Calls For End To Israeli Blockade Of Gaza Strip

Britain Biggest Raid In Human Sex Trafficking Exposed

Police raids on several hundred buildings in the United Kingdom have recovered dozens of sex trafficking victims, mostly from East and South-East Asia, and led to legal charges against dozens of suspects, according to a United Nations report released today [18/11/08].

The largest ever police operation to target sex trafficking in the UK recovered some 167 women and girls forced to work in the sex industry, including 13 children – the youngest just 15 years old.

The UN Inter-Agency Project on Human Trafficking (UNIAP) reported that 528 suspects were arrested during the investigation, code-named Operation Pentameter 2 (UKP2), after UK police raided 157 massage parlours and saunas, and 582 residential premises across the country.

Within a month after the arrests were made, more than 80 individuals were charged for a variety of offences and a number of others remain on bail while investigations continue, said the UN Inter-Agency Project on Human Trafficking (UNIAP) report.

The UNIAP report also noted that the bulk of criminal activity of trafficking for sexual exploitation into the UK originates in South-East Asia, where victims are controlled by debt bondage. Most of the other victims came from Eastern Europe and were coerced into the sex industry through violence.

The operation attacked suspects’ finances and assets as a strategy to cause maximum disruption to their criminal activities. Through UKP2 investigations over £500,000 (about $750,000) in cash has been seized and more than £3 million in further assets was initially restrained pending further investigation, but this figure may increase.

UNIAP was established to facilitate a stronger and more [ coordinated response to human trafficking, in the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS), comprising Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, and Viet Nam.

Source: UN news

Bolivian President Says He Won’t Let DEA Come Back

Bolivian President Evo Morales expressed hope Monday for improved relations with the United States under Barack Obama’s presidency but said he will never allow the US anti-drug agency to resume operating in his country.

The socialist leader, a close ally of Venezuelan Presiden Hugo Chavez, accused the Drug Enforcement Administration of “polotical aggression” in Bolivia, which is a major sourc of coca plants, the rwa ingredients for cocaine. Morales said his government would set up a new intelligence operation involving the military and police to fight drug trafficking in place of the DEA whose Bolivian operations he suspended November 1.

Morales, the former leader of a coca growers union, also said Bolivia will seek to remove coca leaf from the UN list of prohibited drugs. While coca can be

turned into cocaine, Boliians use the small green leaf in its less-potent natural form as a traditonal tea or for chewing. Bolivia-US relations have deteriorated in recent months as Morales’ government halted DEA activites and expelled US Ambassador Philip Goldberg, accusing him of spying and involvement in anti-government protests in the eastern lowlands.

 The US govrnment has denied helping Morales’ opponents and warns that ending the DEA operations will esult in even more cocaine being produced in Bilivia and shipped to the other countries. the State Department did not have any comment on Morales’ latest statement.

Repeating his allegations, Morales announced the ban on DEA operations when asked at a news conference whether he would agree to a return of the DEA after Obama takes office.

“The DEA will not return while I am still president,” Morales said. “The DEA … had an intelligence structure but it wasn’t so much to fight drugs, it has more to do with the political aggression against my government.  …. In recent times, we’ve seen officials of the DEA involved in political conspiracy.”

Noting that he was the first native Indian president of Bolivia and that Obama is the first black president of the United States, Morales said, “I feel tha the world has started to change.”

“My desire is to improve diplpmatic relations, trade relations, co-operation” with the United Statea, he said.

Morales held the news conference after speaking during a General Assembly debate on UN reforms and acheiving UN anti-proverty goals. He was the only head of state to address the session. All others speakers were ambassadors or lower-ranking diplomats.

Source: Barbados Advocate

• President Conference By President Of Bolivia

PM Thompson Calling It As It Is Should Barbadians Worry About Their Assets In US Banks?

   Photo credit -UN

I came across an interesting piece of information on Bajan Dream Project blog where it states that 35,000 bajans live on less than $8.00 a day.

The Project primary aim according to its blog is to ‘deliver a unique intervention by combining skills training, micro-financing and housing provision in a sustainable ‘workfare’ model. Our broad aims are to give the poor the tools needed to earn their own income and grow their personal wealth, while supplementing their economic independence through the provision of affordable housing.’

 At the recent held 63rd UN General Assembly, the topic of poverty, the needs for small nations concerns to be well heeded in the internaional arena and the ongoing global financial crisis in the financial markets today, PM David Thompson wasted no time in declaring his views on the current financial turmoil in the States and its ripple effects throughout the worldwide banking system and stock markets.

 

“Barbados believes that those responsible for the crisis, and who also created, controlled, and manipulated the global financial system for their own advantage, cannot be trusted to heal it,” Prime Minister David Thompson told the assembly.

 

“Developing countries must demonstrate leadership in the search for a lasting solution to the global financial crisis and insist that any exan ercise to institute reforms must strictly adhere to the principles of openness, transparency and inclusiveness, with the United Nations taking the lead,” said the Barbados leader. Source The People Online.

Keltruth Blog Out Of Place

I am all for principles, rights and righteousness but I am somewhat disturbed after reading on Keltruth blog they apparent attempt to malignly embarrass the PM of this country before the United Nations General Assembly where David Thompson is expected to speak this Friday.

The fool-hardy promises of integrity legislation upon assuming offfice which is yet to come into effect is not enough to link the current PM to the scandalous, corrupted affairs of the previous administration in the hope that they too will follow suit. A full year have yet to pass for bajans to take seriously any attempts by this administration to ever implement integrity laws and a Ministerial Code. Before that time any attempt to sent off a letter to United Nations delegates detailing dubious activities over the past years after so soon a young administrationin in office is nothing more than jumping the gun and casting all Barbadians and Barbados as a nation of corrupted thieves.

Hey, Thompson ”convinced that millions of dollars “bizarrely spent” during the previous Barbados Labour Party (BLP) Administration are now stashed in foreign bank accounts,” before a DLP crowd in Canada without any reference of sort, either than ”unearth[ing] horror stories of how millions and millions of dollars were spent in the most bizarre of circumstances,” ”and one day  to be able to track down the bank accounts and expose the culprits,” is just another in a long list of profound statements that successive governments felt the need to utter before a foreign audience rather than on local soil.

Maybe it’s better for an ‘outsider’ to take the lead but Keltruth blog fail to allow the current government to prove its worth. Eight months in office is not  sufficient time in my books. Their season of reckoning is still around the corner.

• Secrets Accounts
• Prove It

Mugabe Sworn In As Zimbabwe Faces Sanctions From Bush

President George W. Bush called Saturday for an international arms embargo against Zimbabwe in the wake of last week’s “sham election,” and announced that the United States is drafting new economic sanctions that, for the first time, would take aim at the entire government of President Robert Mugabe.

Robert Mugabe, who recently declared that “only God” could remove him from power, have now given himself another – sixth – term in office winning by 85.51% of the total vote cast. Morgan Tsvangirai trailed behind with 9.3 percent of the total vote.

Tsvangirai, who had been expected to pit against ruling Zanu PF candidate and incumbent President Mugabe in the run-off election, withdrew last Sunday, citing various reasons, including increasing political violence and intimidation against the opposition MDC-T.

At his inauguration in Harare on Sunday, the hero of Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle, knows he is facing growing international opprobrium, stricter sanctions, and even calls for armed peacekeepers to be sent to Zimbabwe.

“I think,” said Archbishop Desmond Tutu, “that a very good argument can be made for having an international force to restore peace.”

The call for an international arms embargo, which Bush coupled with a proposed ban on travel by officials of the Mugabe government, is unlikely to be successful. American officials said it would almost certainly run into opposition at the United Nations from South Africa, Russia and China; South Africa’s position has long been that the Zimbabwe election is an internal affair.

Adapted from International Press Reports

• Mugabe Given 24 Hour Deadline By Tsvangirai
• Did The ‘An Yue Jiang’ Delivered Its Arm Shipment To Zimbabwe?
• Weapons For Zimbabwe May Return To China
• UPDATED – Chinese Arms Ship Destined For Mugabe Regime – Document Issued 3Days After Zimbabwe Elections!!!
• UPDATED – Mugabe: It Isn’t Over Until I Say So

Millions Of Europeans Lack Safe Drinking Water

Over 100 million Europeans still lack access to safe drinking water, resulting in the deaths from diarrhoea of nearly 40 children everday.

The United Nations today reported that it has resulted in the deaths from diarrhoea of nearly 40 children everyday.More than 170,000 cases of water-related diseases – including over 120,000 cases of viral hepatitis A – were reported in 2006.

In Eastern Europe, some 16% of the population does not have access to drinking water in their homes.In the rural areas, more than half of all people do not have a reliable supply of safe water and adequate sanitation.

{Adapted from International Press Reports}